BBC reveals the Apprentice Predictor

Last week the contestants of the Apprentice faced hearing the F word from the British public for the first time, as the BBC launched a new website. Named the Apprentice Predictor, the nifty new game gives viewers a taster of what it’s like being Sir Alan Sugar, but it by no means affects the outcome of the programme as it’s only a just-for-fun online prediction game.

The service also has a chat element which allows viewers to comment on the contestants and their performances even before the programme starts airing (comments are moderated which is probably for the best).

On the whole The Apprentice Predictor is a neat little idea that is built with an aim to drive traffic to the BBC website and to encourage discussions around the programme. These types of games add an extra dimension to audience interaction by involving viewers and engaging them with additional content and if monetised, it could also be a new revenue stream

See below for a quick demo presented by the big moustache comedian Rufus Hound.

Is cable subscription model under threat?

At the Adage Digital Conference this year, high profile speakers including Verizon’s Chief Marketing Officer John Stratton discussed how IPTV is affecting the cable TV subscription model. Although the view was largely taken from a US TV market point of view, John Stratton acknowledged that IPTV is indeed forcing viewers to cancel their cable TV subscriptions and explore online alternatives such as Hulu, iTunes, Amazon Video and TV.com. These fast growing online services are all based on non-subscription based models including transactional, premium, ad-supported models.

John says that the cable subscription model will continue to exist for certain distributors as long as content providers keep their costs down. On the whole, the general trend suggests that the subscription model for TV is being challenged by rapidly evolving online content providers, but forces are already at work for content providers, distributors and advertisers to start offering IPTV services that are built on simple and flexible model.

You can watch the full speech in below 3Minute AdAge video.

400 mile longboarding challenge

A member of the ANT team is currently longboarding from Mizen Head to Malin Head in Ireland. Alan Smyth is taking on the 400 mile challenge to raise money for the British Heart Foundation and Irish Heart Foundation. Alan is now into the second week of his challenge, you can get updates of his adventure on his blog here and make donations here.

Good luck Alan!

Red Dwarf breaks non-terrestrial records

New episodes of sci-fi comedy Red Dwarf attracted over 2.6 million viewers over the Easter weekend.

The three-part 21st anniversary special "Red Dwarf: Back to Earth" pulled in the highest ever ratings for the UK TV channel Dave, which renamed itself to the Dave Lister channel for the duration.

Part 1, broadcast on Good Friday 10 April between 9pm and 9.30pm, attracted an average digital audience share of 11%, beating BBC2 and Channel 5 for the same time slot. A further 342,000 watched on the timeshift channel Dave ja vu an hour later, with 226,000 recording the show and then watching it from PVR within 3 days.

This makes the Red Dwarf revival the most popular non-terrestrial-analogue commission in the UK, beating the 2006 Torchwood launch episode on BBC3 and the first instalment of Terry Pratchett's "Hogfather" on Sky1.

Red Dwarf ran for eight series on BBC Two between 1988 and 1999 and remains the channel's highest rated show. At its peak, Red Dwarf pulled in around 8.5m viewers and has been broadcast in more than 25 countries.

Mozilla is to overhaul browser design

Mozilla's usability engineers are considering a complete redesign of the look and feel of Firefox as the browser slowly moves to become a complete operating systems. The most radical proposals could replace browser tabs with an interface that looks more like iTunes or a windows-based desktop.

Another idea that Mozilla are playing with is natural language searching. You can see the mockup here and in below video.


Taskfox Prototype from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.

Top TV listing guides by usability

Amongst other things this Easter weekend my family and I had some time to catch up on TV. It reminded me that there was once a time when everyone simply picked up a hard copy of the Radio Times to get an idea of what to watch and when. However, the way we choose programming and watch TV is hugely different to yesteryear.

I took some time out to compare some of the best TV listing sites out there and give a fair review on each of them. There are more than a dozen websites offering TV guides, but I think the following five sites fair better than others, purely because of the their ease of use and interactivity:

1. TV Guide Listing - a great site for getting a whole day’s worth of TV listings of all channels available in the UK, in a single page. Showing weekly and daily programme highlights in photos means you don’t have to read lots of details. The site also lets users view programmes by genre and provides a platform for viewers to discuss programmes.

2. Sky TV Listing – on Sky TV Listing all programmes are tagged by genres, which means you can easily search and browse programmes suited to your interest. Brilliantly designed, the site gives users the option to change viewing format from a simple list to a grid view. If you’re a subscriber already you can also remotely record your favourite TV shows through the website.

3. Tiscali TV Guide – really easy to use, this site offers user ratings on all programmes. It also allows users to fully customise their listings by channel, a feature that other TV listing sites don’t do well.

4. Radio Times – is practically the same as all of above, but it offers fewer and more structured channel listings. It also lists radio programmes and films on a separate tab. In addition, you can also view exclusive behind the scene photos and features which what makes it worth revisiting.

5. On the Box – works similarly to all the aforementioned services, but the site also provides independent reviews on programmes some of which are highly amusing to read. It's worth checking out.

All of above TV listing sites have great usability features. In a few years time, I can see these types of services becoming widely available on TV screens, giving viewers greater flexibility in accessing over-the-top (OTT) information and third party reviews, so you don't have to flick through pages and pages of TV listings with a pen in your hand.

‘Super simplicity’ will rein the Connected Homes

Interesting research emerged from Ericsson ConsumerLab last week on the future of connected TV. The report titled ‘IPTV and the Connected Home' examines digital content consumption in the home and found that there’s growing consumer interest in IPTV services.

Although the research talks about some of the evident trends in the consumption of connected TV, I found the following tidbits worth digesting:

• One third (33%) of the internet population in the UK are interested in creating ‘connected home’ environments, but the early adopters are still having to rely on DIY solutions to create home entertainment systems

• 64% of UK consumers would like to have wireless connectivity between all digital media devices to facilitate the quick and easy sharing of digital content

• Over half of UK consumers would like greater freedom and flexibility to access digital content from any device, from anywhere, combined with wireless connectivity between all digital content devices

• The operators need to deliver 'super simplicity' in order to drive mass-market take-up of advanced IPTV-based and connected home functionality

There’s no doubt that the demand for advanced TV and connected features are shifting from early adopters to a much wider user base. However, as the research rightly suggests, TV viewers are increasingly expecting connected TV through a simple and seamless delivery platform. However, simplicity shouldn’t get in the way of innovation. In fact, both should go hand in hand when implementing IPTV services.

IPTV World Forum - Day 2

The show picked up on Thursday, with evidently more visitors passing by our stand than on Wednesday. Whilst, I didn’t get as much of a chance to walk around yesterday, here’s my take on what was sparking the interest in my industry discussions.

With the general tone of discussions swayed towards the development of open IPTV standards, both operators and manufactures were showing great interest in the sharing of practical specifications on IPTV standards and the development of commercially viable IPTV models. Much of the questions thrown my way were around our open developer platform, the ANT Academy. And, on stand we had firm interest from a several new companies interested in joining the platform to help shape their propositions.

What’s more, our Amazon TV shopping application demo was drawing in the attention on stand. A great example of a practical way to implement and monetise third party content on an IPTV platform, visitors were intrigued by the search capability, which provoked discussions around consumers’ expectations.

All in all, it was nice to see some traction building up for the IPTV industry and it seems the whole eco-system is shaping up nicely for the industry.

IPTV World Forum – Day 1

IPTV World Forum kicked off today with a number of strong brands coming under a one roof to showcase what they’ve been up to in the past year. From looking around the show, it was obvious that market consolidation has shaped the industry in the last year. Most of the exhibitors were recognised brands and the start-ups of last year, had either grown up or were noticeable by their absence. The IPTV market has seemingly matured.

What’s more, from equipment manufacturers to middleware providers, the theme of this year’s event was very much focused on the consumer. The IPTV industry has taken note of who really matters and started to articulate better, with a focus on user-centric multimedia services. It might be making more exhilarating graphics for connected TVs or improving the transitioning between applications, but it is obvious that the industry is thinking about how it can deliver applications that enhance the users’ TV viewing experience, without interrupting them.

If you’re visiting the IPTV World Forum tomorrow, then please do drop by our stand (70). We can talk to you about our newly launched ANT Academy (amongst other things), which has already attracted a number of interested members at today’s show

More from us tomorrow…

Britain is a nation of Youtube addicts

This week, ComScore released yet more interesting figures, highlighting a 10 percent increase in online video viewing in the UK. According to the research the total unique audience for online videos reached 29.6m last year, with over 80 percent of all internet users tuning in to watch videos online.

The research also noted that 23.5m UK viewers watched over 2 billion videos on YouTube during the past year – that’s 86 videos per viewer.

Video sharing sites are not the only platform to attract viewers. BBC’s VOD service held a significant lead among TV broadcasters with nearly 55m videos being viewed in 2008. See detailed stats below.

From Sci Fi to Syfy, what’s the difference?

According to Media Week, NBC is the latest company to exercise rebranding during this tough climate. NBC is rebranding its Sci Fi Channel to Syfy, which will be introduced first in the US in July, with UK activities due to follow suit at the beginning of Q3 this year.

Although I’m somewhat undecided about the so called “phonetic” name change, the company explains “the new spelling will allow NBC to have an ownable trademark that it hopes will gain greater recognition among consumers across new-media and non-linear digital platforms - such as Hulu and iTunes”.

Last year both Sky and ITV renamed their VOD services to Sky Player and ITV Player respectively, as posted here.

ANT Galio is shortlisted for IPTV World Series Awards

We’re all extremely excited over here to have been shortlisted for the IPTV World Series Awards in the Best IPTV Service Delivery Platform or Client Software category.

It’s great to be recognised for ANT Galio which has gone from strength to strength in the worldwide IPTV market. I’ll be attending the awards ceremony (25th March, Millennium Gloucester Hotel, London) to fly the flag for ANT.

If you’re attending feel free to drop by and say ‘hello!’

BSkyB prepares for 3D content

Rapid TV News has reported that BSkyB is to launch a 3D service in the near future. Sky’s chief engineer broadcast strategist, Chris Johns, has reportedly told a London conference that Sky will increasingly focus on building and delivering its own archive of 3D material as part of Sky’s “Vision of the Future”; services like the Arts Channel, sports and general entertainment will be the first to receive investment.

Sky’s decision to invest in 3D systems is driven by the burgeoning distribution demand from Hollywood, which is said to be releasing some 61 movies in 3D over the next 18 months.

Interestingly, Sky is also said to be focused on delivering everyday 3D home entertainment through simple and cost-effective technology routes without the need for newer “3D Ready” or “HD Ready” set-top boxes.

IPTV industry must also face up to scrutiny around behavioural advertising

The online advertising industry has launched a set of guidelines for a genre of web adverts that have been causing controversy.

The code of practice has been drawn up by the Internet Advertising Bureau and focuses on the emergence of behavioural advertising, a form of targeting consumers based on people’s browsing activity.

The TV industry should be listening closely to this news. It’s an issue that could soon spill into the TV world as service providers start to converge traditional broadcast channels with content from the web.

Telcos, other service providers and advertisers themselves have been talking about the convergence of the TV & the web for some time. In many ways, it’s a case of when, and not if, it will happen. Convergence will revolutionise the way people watch and use the TV, but it will also mean that broadcasters have to be much more targeted in their advertising. However, there’s a fine line to tread between offering consumers good, targeted services based on viewing preferences and what could be perceived as ‘snooping’. Whatever the outcome of this discussion, eventually the TV industry will have to face up to these issues and adopt some sort of guidelines or best practice of its own.

If you have any thoughts of your own on this – I’d be glad to hear more about them.

BBC experiments with real-time content

The BBC is publicly testing an interesting online project called BBC News Radar, an online app that displays the latest BBC news and updates in a simple and streamlined format, similar to the microblogging phenomenon Twitter. On the BBC Journalist Labs blog, Jake MacMullin, the developer behind the app, revealed that the BBC might even consider placing it permanently on the BBC website.


Now, it’s quite interesting to see mainstream media like the BBC is taking the initiative to introduce real-time content. With the web constantly grappling for our dwindling attention, it kind of makes sense for content providers to offer more concise and speedy content updates. With technology improvements increasingly delivering content to the user instantly, there’s no doubt that real-time content will be favoured in future.

Here at ANT, we’ve already begun to see demand for this type of concise news content to be delivered direct to the TV. In fact, we’ll be demonstrating something that meets this demand in a couple of weeks time at the IPTV World Forum in London.

If you’re planning to attend the show why not pay us a visit, we’ll be at stand number 70.

Weekly news roundup 27.02.09

IPTV

• The Guardian reports that starting up project Canvas could cost up to £24m
• Microsoft improves its Xbox Live service proposition (via TechRadar)

On Demand

• ITV on-demand becomes available on Virgin Media’s catch up service (via TechRadar)
• Panasonic revealed that the BBC iPlayer will come to Freesat this year, allowing on-demand TV to be watched through set top boxes without subscribing to Virgin Media. (via ElectricPig)
• YouTube and iPlayer heading for Freeview mark two (via Telegraph)

Content providers

• Amazon Beats Apple's iTunes As Preferred Digital Media Provider according to Strategy Analytics.
• Popular video-sharing site Metacafe aims to launch optimised service through IPTV (via NMA)

HDTV

• Telegraph article covers which broadcasters delivering HD content at what costs

Blu-ray

• Panasonic launches duel tuner Freesat HD PVR (via TechWatch)

50Mbps broadband: yay or nay?

I’ve been following the series of Speed Diary posts from Darren Waters on BBC dot.life in which he questions the real benefit of having 50Mbps broadband connection in an average household, where you get an adequate performance at a connection speed as low as 3mbps.

Broadband providers are increasingly using the term “high speed” as a strap line to sell broadband packages without really highlighting the benefits for end users, therefore Darren’s attempt to challenge it is a valid one.

So, in order to find out how the experience of using 50Mbps broadband compared with less speedier ASDL connection, Darren performed some of the most bandwidth intensive activities such as video streaming (iPlayer), and online gaming (Xbox), and simultaneous downloads. During the test, he made the following observations, which are interesting:

1. Having faster broadband doesn’t necessarily improve the speed of your web browsing experience
2. Accessing the web over wi-fi on a portable device like an iPhone or PSP with a 50Mbps connection seems no different to using an ADSL 6Mbps connection
3. Speed Tests are useful but no replacement for the actual experience in using a connection

Although I suspect the first two points might have their rightful place in the current market, I believe the quality of high-speed broadband will eventually catch up as the demand for multi-platform, streamlined HD content increases. However, I do agree with the last point that broadband speed alone shouldn’t define the quality of experience of using mega speedy broadband.

Take a few minutes to read Darren’s diary posts as it makes a very interesting read:

Speed Diary: Day One
Speed Diary: Day Two
Speed Diary: Day Three
Speed Diary: Day Four

The Future of interactive TV revealed

There was a great story in the Metro last week picking up on some predictions from interactive technology research house Future Laboratory based around the future of interactive TV and networked homes. Although the mainstream media has been riding on the TV on Contact Lenses headlines, I particularly enjoyed the following predictions:

1. Intelligent home entertainment management system based on humanoid avatars will be huge. What’s more these interactive avatars will eliminate the need for content search through a remote control as it will enable viewers to control TV through voice recognition or dialogue.
2. The choice for channels will continue to grow but user generated content (UGC) will equally dominate viewers preference for home entertainment
3. With TV screens networked to the internet, viewers will be able to tailor their home entertainment the way they customise social networking sites like Myspace
4. Watching a telly will no longer be passive as people will be share preferences and connect with others through their networked TVs
5. Multi-sensory technology planted on our bodies will enable highly immersive TV watching experience

Although some of these may seem a little too futuristic for some we’ve already seem some of these themes demonstrated at shows & exhibitions in the last 12 months. UGC, Avatars and Social Networking sites on the TV are more than just ideas.

You can read the full story here

Weekly IPTV news roundup

So much is going on in our industry at the moment, I'm having a hard time keeping up.

As is customary for Q1 there’s a wealth of forecast statistics and deployment numbers being circulated in the news. Here’s a brief round-up of stories that I’ve seen in the past few weeks:

IPTV in France

• 1/3 of all French broadband subscribers now take an IPTV service, according to France's telecoms regulator Arcep.
• France now has 5.4 million IPTV subscribers and is growing at 39% year on year.
• France Telecom's Orange TV is the market leader with 1.5m subs or around 27% of the market, with Neuf TV in second place.

Global IPTV

• Worldwide IPTV subscribers reach 16m
• Meanwhile, In-Stat is predicting that the global IPTV market will more than treble by the end of 2012 and will break the 72 million mark in 2013.

IPTV carriers

• Estonia's Elion announced that they ended 2008 with 82,500 IPTV and cable subscribers, up from 57,700 the previous year. Elion now estimates it has a 26% share of the cable market but remains in 3rd place after Starman and STV.

Set-top box

• Amino have shipped over 2m units

Interview with Tattletech

Last week, I was kindly asked to take part in the Tattletech Hot Seat where we discussed some relevant trends in the IPTV industry including TV widgets, mobile apps and IPTV browser technology. You can read the full interview here.

While you take a few minutes to read the interview, please do check out some of their other stories covering news and opinions from the telecommunications industry and mobile sector.